Devices are capable of accepting handwriting inputs as a user input modality. For example, tablets, notebook computers, smart phones, laptop computers, etc., often are equipped with a surface, e.g., a display surface such as a touch screen display, which also accepts handwriting inputs. A handwriting input sub-system accepts user inputs, e.g., from a pen, stylus or even a finger tip, and interprets them into an appropriate format.
Commonly these handwriting inputs may be left in graphics form (i.e., left in handwritten form) for insertion into a document or the handwriting inputs may be converted to machine text, e.g., rendered in an optical character recognition-like procedure to fonts available to a particular application, e.g., word processing application, email application, portable document format application, etc. Therefore a user may provide handwriting inputs to many different applications, e.g., text based application, drawing applications, etc.
Certain devices now allow users to provide handwriting inputs into entry fields, e.g., text entry fields in forms. To do so, a user typically selects the entry field (e.g., with a stylus) and thereafter proceeds to provide the handwriting input, which is thereafter inserted into the entry field by the device's handwriting sub-system. Often, as described herein, the handwriting input is formatted into machine text for entry.